Grand Depart of the Tour de France 2017 in Düsseldorf - Everything about the Tour start in Düsseldorf
Unbekannt
· 21.06.2017
After twelve years of abstinence, the Tour de France is making a stop in Germany again in 2017: Düsseldorf is hosting the Grand Départ, as the event package with the opening stages of the tour is called. On Saturday, 1 July 2017, a 14-kilometre individual time trial will take place from the exhibition centre along the Rhine and through the city centre.
The following day, the peloton starts in the capital of North Rhine-Westphalia. After just a few kilometres, the first mountain classification (4th category) of the 2017 Tour awaits the pros at the racecourse in Grafenberger Wald. The 203.5-kilometre route for the day then continues through the Neandertal valley and back to Düsseldorf via Mettmann and Ratingen. The route then continues to Mönchengladbach, where the sprint classification will be located, and via Aachen to the stage finish in Liège. The entire route of the Tour de France including all stages you will find here.
The city of Düsseldorf is offering an extensive supporting programme for young and old. Among other things, there will be the final of the "Pétit Départ", which aims to motivate Düsseldorf's schoolchildren to take up cycling and cycling as a sport. We have put together the official programme for the Grand Départ.
Details of the route:
1st stage (individual time trial) on 1 July 2017 in Düsseldorf, 14 kilometres
The riders start at the Düsseldorf Exhibition Centre and ride along the banks of the Rhine. They pass the Ehrenhof cultural centre and continue over the Oberkasseler Brücke bridge to Oberkassel on the left bank of the Rhine.
With a view of the Rhine Tower and the NRW state parliament, the route heads back over the Rheinkniebrücke bridge, past the Medienhafen harbour and towards the city centre. The hunt for the best time continues on the famous Königsallee shopping street. At the end of the "Kö", the route passes the Tritonenbrunnen fountain and switches to Heinrich-Heine-Allee to return to the banks of the Rhine past the Deutsche Oper opera house.
Stage 2 on 2 July 2017 from Düsseldorf to Liège, 203.5 kilometres
Before the 2nd stage of the Tour de France 2017, all riders ride to Burgplatz, where they officially sign in and present themselves to the public. This is where the neutralised start takes place, a slow roll-in of the riders. The eight-kilometre-long neutralisation first runs through the old town towards the Medienhafen.
The riders stop at the Living Bridge, which spans the harbour basin, for an official ceremony before rolling through Düsseldorf city centre. The sharp start (kilometre 0) takes place on Fischerstraße. From here, the field picks up speed.
After the first flat kilometres through the state capital, the route climbs towards the racecourse - at Grafenberger Wald, the pros will fight for the first points for the 2017 mountain jersey at a 4th category mountain classification. From Grafenberg, the course leads through Gerresheim and into the town of Erkrath. The second stage of the 2017 Tour de France then winds its way through the Neandertal valley up to Mettmann before the riders cross Ratingen and return to Düsseldorf. This is a first for the Tour de France, as it is the first time that a stage has left the city where it started and returned to it.
The route then crosses the Rhine over the Theodor Heuss Bridge into the Oberkassel district. At kilometre 52, the riders leave the Düsseldorf city area again and pass through the Rhine district of Neuss, via Meerbusch to Neuss. The peloton crosses Neuss city centre and then reaches the North Rhine-Westphalian cycling stronghold of Kaarst-Büttgen.
On the following route from Korschenbroich to Mönchengladbach via the L 381, the teams prepare for the first sprint classification of the 2017 Tour de France, which is taken at kilometre 83 in Mönchengladbach city centre.
Through the district of Heinsberg, past the Garzweiler 1 open-cast mine, the riders reach the district of Düren and the historic town of Jülich, which was part of the French territory in the Département de la Roer from 1794 to 1814, as well as the municipalities of Titz and Aldenhoven.
After the city region of Aachen with the towns of Alsdorf and Würselen, the cathedral city of Aachen is the last German city through which the Tour de France 2017 will pass. The cycling pros then pass the German-Belgian border via the B264. The last 51 kilometres of the stage are on Belgian soil until the finish of stage 2: Liège.
